


being a (maybe) teen dad is hard and no one (except maybe the mom) understands

by chromyrose



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb Session, Established Relationship, F/M, Fanfiction of Fanfiction, Teen Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-19
Updated: 2012-12-19
Packaged: 2017-11-21 14:55:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chromyrose/pseuds/chromyrose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>set in CapriciousPancake's Bucket List AU (and won't make sense without knowing that). Rose tells Dave she's pregnant on a hot, hazy summer's day.</p>
            </blockquote>





	being a (maybe) teen dad is hard and no one (except maybe the mom) understands

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



Sometimes, though, they just lie on the floor of Dave’s bedroom, his shitty portable radio between them blaring out a static ridden Top 40 playlist, and commercials for acne cream and gas station coffee.

Dave looks at Rose; his desire to kiss her has recently, somehow, begun to simultaneously wax and wane. She’s a beautiful girl, with her short hair fanned around her like a straw halo, and purple eyes like pilfered gemstones. But the thought of her doesn’t make Dave hot anymore, just warm, as though the fire was no longer in his loins but alive nonetheless in his chest.

His eyes skim over the contours of her lying body. “Maybe you should cut back on the ice cream sandwiches.”

Her lips curl, but it never becomes her infamous sneer. “I’m pregnant, actually.”

“ _What?_ ”

Rose hums.

“How… what? How long, I mean, how far along…?”

“Four months.”

“And you’ve known…?”

“I’ve been sure for two months.”

The radio stutters _Can you feel the love tonight?_ , and Dave speaks around the lump in his throat. 

“Is it… mine?”

For the first time, Rose hesitates, and she breathes, “…Yes.”

“Shit,” Dave hisses. His eyes start burning so he shuts them, pinching the bridge of his nose for good measure. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

He knows that Rose respects him enough to tell him the truth; or maybe, in light of the situation, he can only hope so. 

“Because, you’re just a boy.”

“One who made a man’s mistake.”

Rose swept herself up elegantly and looked at him; now their knees were close to touching on the itchy carpet. Dave wondered, not for the first time, if he shouldn’t ask her to marry him, but then she wasn’t really the marrying sort, and he wasn’t sure he was either. Besides, Rose probably deserved someone better than a boy who sometimes dreamt of cock. She deserved a man who would sweep in like a gale and carry her off in strong, capable, heterosexual arms. 

Her hand cupped his cheek and she tried for a smile, but Dave could tell it was pained. 

“It’s going to be okay.”

“Shit, Rose.”

She shushed him, and gently patted his cheek.

“You’re just a girl.”  
“One who made a woman’s mistake.”

Dave wanted to shake his head at her, to laugh, to cry. He did none of those things.

“What can I do…? Do you need something? Money? Having a… a kid, that’s expensive as fuck.”

He knew that from overhearing his parents (father) grumble over the bills; that’s when he remembered that his mother was pregnant as well. The realization almost made him miss Rose’s answer as it settled in.

“-insurance is covering all of the doctor’s visits, and she’s rather reluctantly but dutifully offering all the help she can give.”

Her mother. Rose didn’t need to mention that the help was probably minimal and offered with a heavy, drunken tongue, at best. 

“That’s good of her.”

Rose nodded. For a few minutes it was only the sound of the radio keeping them from total silence, and the stifling heat that Dave was growing more aware of made him think of the phrase, the dog days of summer. But, it was only June.

“I’m terrified.” Rose confessed in a raspy, grave whisper. 

Dave had never seen Rose cry before, and even now she had her nose pressed into his shoulder, and her body was tense. But there was no doubt in his mind that she was crying regardless. He thought of her notebooks, the openness, fear that was on her face when she watched him read them, and of their own volition his arms came up around her body. Her stomach pressed against his knee and he felt the resistance, the gentle push of something not quite as soft as it should be, or as flat. He moved his leg out of the way.

“That’s stupid, because you’re gonna be an awesome mom.”

Rose shuddered into the fabric of his shirt, and he tried a smile. “All you have to do is everything your mom didn’t.”

\--

A month later, Dave received a letter postmarked from New York with a note, and a very indiscernible black and white photo.

 _I know it’s impossible to make her out,_ Rose had written in purple ink, _but that’s her first baby photo._

\--

He doesn’t find out that Roxy might not be his until after he’s held her in his arms. When Rose drops this bombshell on him, Dave’s lips thin into a straight line and he asks, “Does the other guy give a shit?”

“Dave, language.” Rose chastises, motherhood having made an adult out of her too soon. And yet, “No, he doesn’t.”

He wants to snort, wants to laugh and say _That figures,_ but instead he strokes Roxy’s soft cheek and smiles. “Then she’s mine and no one can do a damn thing about it.”


End file.
